A. Restrictions
The purpose of this part of the handbook is to present basic
information about coercive techniques available for use in the
interrogation situation. It is vital that this discussion not be
misconstrued as constituting authorization for the use of
coercion at field discretion . As was noted earlier, there is no
such blanket authorization.
[approx. 10 lines deleted]
For both ethical and pragmatic reasons no interrogator may
take upon himself the unilateral responsibility for using
coercive methods. Concealing from the interrogator's superiors an
intent to resort to coercion, or its unapproved employment, does
not protect them. It places them, and KUBARK, in unconsidered
jeopardy.
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B. The Theory of Coercion
Coercive procedures are designed not only to exploit the
resistant source's internal conflicts and induce him to wrestle
with himself but also to bring a superior outside force to bear
upon the subject's resistance. Non-coercive methods are not
likely to succeed if their selection and use is not predicated
upon an accurate psychological assessment of the source. In
contrast, the same coercive method may succeed against persons
who are very unlike each other. The changes of success rise
steeply, nevertheless, if the coercive technique is matched to
the source's personality. Individuals react differently even to
such seemingly non-discriminatory stimuli as drugs. Moreover, it
is a waste of time and energy to apply strong pressures on a
hit-or-miss basis if a tap on the psychological jugular will
produce compliance.
All coercive techniques are designed to induce regression. As
Hinkle notes in "The Physiological State of the
Interrogation Subject as it Affects Brain Function"(7), the
result of external pressures of sufficient intensity is the loss
of those defenses most recently acquired by civilized man:
"... the capacity to carry out the highest creative
activities, to meet new, challenging, and complex situations, to
deal with trying interpersonal relations, and to cope with
repeated frustrations. Relatively small degrees of homeostatic
derangement, fatigue, pain, sleep loss, or anxiety may impair
these functions." As a result, "most people who are
exposed to coercive procedures will talk and usually reveal some
information that they might not have revealed otherwise."
One subjective reaction often evoked by coercion is a feeling
of guilt. Meltzer observes, "In some lengthy interrogations,
the interrogator may, by virtue of his role as the sole supplier
of satisfaction and punishment, assume the stature and importance
of a parental figure in the prisoner's feeling and thinking.
Although there may be intense hatred for the interrogator, it is
not unusual for warm feelings also to develop. This ambivalence
is the basis for guilt reactions, and if the interrogator
nourishes these feelings, the guilt may be strong enough to
influence the prisoner's behavior.... Guilt makes compliance more
likely...."(7).
Farber says that the response to coercion typically contains
"... at least three important elements: debility,
dependency, and dread." Prisoners "... have reduced
viability, are helplessly dependent on their captors for the
satisfaction of their many basic needs, and experience the
emotional and motivational reactions of intense fear and
anxiety.... Among the [American] POW's pressured by the Chinese
Communists, the DDD syndrome in its full-blown form constituted a
state of discomfort that was well-nigh intolerable." (11).
If the debility-dependency-dread state is unduly prolonged,
however, the arrestee may sink into a defensive apathy from which
it is hard to arouse him.
Psychologists and others who write about physical or
psychological duress frequently object that under sufficient
pressure subjects usually yield but that their ability to recall
and communicate information accurately is as impaired as the will
to resist. This pragmatic objection has somewhat the same
validity for a counterintelligence interrogation as for any
other. But there is one significant difference. Confession is a
necessary prelude to the CI interrogation of a hitherto
unresponsive or concealing source. And the use of coercive
techniques will rarely or never confuse an interrogatee so
completely that he does not know whether his own confession is
true or false. He does not need full mastery of all his powers of
resistance and discrimination to know whether he is a spy or not.
Only subjects who have reached a point where they are under
delusions are likely to make false confessions that they believe.
Once a true confession is obtained, the classic cautions apply.
The pressures are lifted, at least enough so that the subject can
provide counterintelligence information as accurately as
possible. In fact, the relief granted the subject at this time
fits neatly into the interrogation plan. He is told that the
changed treatment is a reward for truthfulness and an evidence
that friendly handling will continue as long as he cooperates.
The profound moral objection to applying duress past the point
of irreversible psychological damage has been stated. Judging the
validity of other ethical arguments about coercion exceeds the
scope of this paper. What is fully clear, however, is that
controlled coercive manipulation of an interrogatee may impair
his ability to make fine distinctions but will not alter his
ability to answer correctly such gross questions as "Are you
a Soviet agent? What is your assignment now? Who is your present
case officer?"
When an interrogator senses that the subject's resistance is
wavering, that his desire to yield is growing stronger than his
wish to continue his resistance, the time has come to provide him
with the acceptable rationalization: a face-saving reason or
excuse for compliance. Novice interrogators may be tempted to
seize upon the initial yielding triumphantly and to personalize
the victory. Such a temptation must be rejected immediately. An
interrogation is not a game played by two people, one to become
the winner and the other the loser. It is simply a method of
obtaining correct and useful information. Therefore the
interrogator should intensify the subject's desire to cease
struggling by showing him how he can do so without seeming to
abandon principle, self-protection, or other initial causes of
resistance. If, instead of providing the right rationalization at
the right time, the interrogator seizes gloatingly upon the
subject's wavering, opposition will stiffen again.
The following are the principal coercive techniques of
interrogation: arrest, detention, deprivation of sensory stimuli
through solitary confinement or similar methods, threats and
fear, debility, pain, heightened suggestibility and hypnosis,
narcosis, and induced regression. This section also discusses the
detection of malingering by interrogatees and the provision of
appropriate rationalizations for capitulating and cooperating.
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C. Arrest
The manner and timing of arrest can contribute substantially
to the interrogator's purposes. "What we aim to do is to
ensure that the manner of arrest achieves, if possible, surprise,
and the maximum amount of mental discomfort in order to catch the
suspect off balance and to deprive him of the initiative. One
should therefore arrest him at a moment when he least expects it
and when his mental and physical resistance is at its lowest. The
ideal time at which to arrest a person is in the early hours of
the morning because surprise is achieved then, and because a
person's resistance physiologically as well as psychologically is
at its lowest.... If a person cannot be arrested in the early
hours..., then the next best time is in the evening....
[approx. 10 lines deleted]" (1)
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D. Detention
If, through the cooperation of a liaison service or by
unilateral means, arrangements have been made for the confinement
of a resistant source, the circumstances of detention are
arranged to enhance within the subject his feelings of being cut
off from the known and the reassuring, and of being plunged into
the strange. Usually his own clothes are immediately taken away,
because familiar clothing reinforces identity and thus the
capacity for resistance. (Prisons give close hair cuts and issue
prison garb for the same reason.) If the interrogatee is
especially proud or neat, it may be useful to give him an outfit
that is one or two sizes too large and to fail to provide a belt,
so that he must hold his pants up.
The point is that man's sense of identity depends upon a
continuity in his surroundings, habits, appearance, actions,
relations with others, etc. Detention permits the interrogator to
cut through these links and throw the interrogatee back upon his
own unaided internal resources.
Little is gained if confinement merely replaces one routine
with another. Prisoners who lead monotonously unvaried lives
"... cease to care about their utterances, dress, and
cleanliness. They become dulled, apathetic, and
depressed."(7) And apathy can be a very effective defense
against interrogation. Control of the source's environment
permits the interrogator to determine his diet, sleep pattern,
and other fundamentals. Manipulating these into irregularities,
so that the subject becomes disorientated, is very likely to
create feelings of fear and helplessness. Hinkle points out,
"People who enter prison with attitudes of foreboding,
apprehension, and helplessness generally do less well than those
who enter with assurance and a conviction that they can deal with
anything that they may encounter.... Some people who are afraid
of losing sleep, or who do not wish to lose sleep, soon succumb
to sleep loss...." (7)
In short, the prisoner should not be provided a routine to
which he can adapt and from which he can draw some comfort -- or
at least a sense of his own identity. Everyone has read of
prisoners who were reluctant to leave their cells after prolonged
incarceration. Little is known about the duration of confinement
calculated to make a subject shift from anxiety, coupled with a
desire for sensory stimuli and human companionship, to a passive,
apathetic acceptance of isolation and an ultimate pleasure in
this negative state. Undoubtedly the rate of change is determined
almost entirely by the psychological characteristics of the
individual. In any event, it is advisable to keep the subject
upset by constant disruptions of patterns.
For this reason, it is useful to determine whether the
interrogattee has been jailed before, how often, under what
circumstances, for how long, and whether he was subjected to
earlier interrogation. Familiarity with confinement and even with
isolation reduces the effect.
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E. Deprivation of Sensory Stimuli
The chief effect of arrest and detention, and particularly of
solitary confinement, is to deprive the subject of many or most
of the sights, sounds, tastes, smells, and tactile sensations to
which he has grown accustomed. John C. Lilly examined eighteen
autobiographical accounts written by polar explorers and solitary
seafarers. He found "... that isolation per se acts on most
persons as a powerful stress.... In all cases of survivors of
isolation at sea or in the polar night, it was the first exposure
which caused the greatest fears and hence the greatest danger of
giving way to symptoms; previous experience is a powerful aid in
going ahead, despite the symptoms. "The symptoms most
commonly produced by isolation are superstition, intense love of
any other living thing, perceiving inanimate objects as alive,
hallucinations, and delusions." (26)
The apparent reason for these effects is that a person cut off
from external stimuli turns his awareness inward, upon himself,
and then projects the contents of his own unconscious outwards,
so that he endows his faceless environment with his own
attributes, fears, and forgotten memories. Lilly notes, "It
is obvious that inner factors in the mind tend to be projected
outward, that some of the mind's activity which is usually
reality-bound now becomes free to turn to phantasy and ultimately
to hallucination and delusion."
A number of experiments conducted at McGill University, the
National Institute of Mental Health, and other sites have
attempted to come as close as possible to the elimination of
sensory stimuli, or to masking remaining stimuli, chiefly sounds,
by a stronger but wholly monotonous overlay. The results of these
experiments have little applicability to interrogation because
the circumstances are dissimilar. Some of the findings point
toward hypotheses that seem relevant to interrogation, but
conditions like those of detention for purposes of
counterintelligence interrogation have not been duplicated for
experimentation.
At the National Institute of Mental Health two subjects were
"... suspended with the body and all but the top of the head
immersed in a tank containing slowly flowing water at 34.5
[degrees] C (94.5 [degrees] F)...." Both subjects wore
black-out masks, which enclosed the whole head but allowed
breathing and nothing else. The sound level was extremely low;
the subject heard only his own breathing and some faint sounds of
water from the piping. Neither subject stayed in the tank longer
than three hours. Both passed quickly from normally directed
thinking through a tension resulting from unsatisfied hunger for
sensory stimuli and concentration upon the few available
sensations to private reveries and fantasies and eventually to
visual imagery somewhat resembling hallucinations.
"In our experiments, we notice that after immersion the
day apparently is started over, i. e., the subject feels as if he
has risen from bed afresh; this effect persists, and the subject
finds he is out of step with the clock for the rest of the
day."
Drs. Wexler, Mendelson, Leiderman, and Solomon conducted a
somewhat similar experiment on seventeen paid volunteers. These
subjects were "... placed in a tank-type respirator with a
specially built mattress.... The vents of the respirator were
left open, so that the subject breathed for himself. His arms and
legs were enclosed in comfortable but rigid cylinders to inhibit
movement and tactile contact. The subject lay on his back and was
unable to see any part of his body. The motor of the respirator
was run constantly, producing a dull, repetitive auditory
stimulus. The room admitted no natural light, and artificial
light was minimal and constant." (42) Although the
established time limit was 36 hours and though all physical needs
were taken care of, only 6 of the 17 completed the stint. The
other eleven soon asked for release. Four of these terminated the
experiment because of anxiety and panic; seven did so because of
physical discomfort. The results confirmed earlier findings that
(1) the deprivation of sensory stimuli induces stress; (2) the
stress becomes unbearable for most subjects; (3) the subject has
a growing need for physical and social stimuli; and (4) some
subjects progressively lose touch with reality, focus inwardly,
and produce delusions, hallucinations, and other pathological
effects.
In summarizing some scientific reporting on sensory and
perceptual deprivation, Kubzansky offers the following
observations:
"Three studies suggest that the more well-adjusted or
'normal' the subject is, the more he is affected by deprivation
of sensory stimuli. Neurotic and psychotic subjects are either
comparatively unaffected or show decreases in anxiety,
hallucinations, etc." (7)
These findings suggest - but by no means prove - the following
theories about solitary confinement and isolation:
1. The more completely the place of confinement eliminates
sensory stimuli, the more rapidly and deeply will the
interrogatee be affected. Results produced only after weeks or
months of imprisonment in an ordinary cell can be duplicated in
hours or days in a cell which has no light (or weak artificial
light which never varies), which is sound-proofed, in which odors
are eliminated, etc. An environment still more subject to
control, such as water-tank or iron lung, is even more effective.
2. An early effect of such an environment is anxiety. How soon
it appears and how strong it is depends upon the psychological
characteristics of the individual.
3. The interrogator can benefit from the subject's anxiety. As
the interrogator becomes linked in the subject's mind with the
reward of lessened anxiety, human contact, and meaningful
activity, and thus with providing relief for growing discomfort,
the questioner assumes a benevolent role. (7)
4. The deprivation of stimuli induces regression by depriving
the subject's mind of contact with an outer world and thus
forcing it in upon itself. At the same time, the calculated
provision of stimuli during interrogation tends to make the
regressed subject view the interrogator as a father-figure. The
result, normally, is a strengthening of the subject's tendencies
toward compliance.
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F. Threats and Fear
The threat of coercion usually weakens or destroys resistance
more effectively than coercion itself. The threat to inflict
pain, for example, can trigger fears more damaging than the
immediate sensation of pain. In fact, most people underestimate
their capacity to withstand pain. The same principle holds for
other fears: sustained long enough, a strong fear of anything
vague or unknown induces regression, whereas the materialization
of the fear, the infliction of some form of punishment, is likely
to come as a relief. The subject finds that he can hold out, and
his resistances are strengthened. "In general, direct
physical brutality creates only resentment, hostility, and
further defiance." (18)
The effectiveness of a threat depends not only on what sort of
person the interrogatee is and whether he believes that his
questioner can and will carry the threat out but also on the
interrogator's reasons for threatening. If the interrogator
threatens because he is angry, the subject frequently senses the
fear of failure underlying the anger and is strengthened in his
own resolve to resist. Threats delivered coldly are more
effective than those shouted in rage. It is especially important
that a threat not be uttered in response to the interrogatee's
own expressions of hostility. These, if ignored, can induce
feelings of guilt, whereas retorts in kind relieve the subject's
feelings.
Another reason why threats induce compliance not evoked by the
inflection of duress is that the threat grants the interrogatee
time for compliance. It is not enough that a resistant source
should placed under the tension of fear; he must also discern an
acceptable escape route. Biderman observes, "Not only can
the shame or guilt of defeat in the encounter with the
interrogator be involved, but also the more fundamental
injunction to protect one's self-autonomy or 'will'.... A simple
defense against threats to the self from the anticipation of
being forced to comply is, of course, to comply 'deliberately' or
'voluntarily'.... To the extent that the foregoing interpretation
holds, the more intensely motivated the [interrogatee] is to
resist, the more intense is the pressure toward early compliance
from such anxieties, for the greater is the threat to self-esteem
which is involved in contemplating the possibility of being
'forced to' comply...." (6) In brief, the threat is like all
other coercive techniques in being most effective when so used as
to foster regression and when joined with a suggested way out of
the dilemma, a rationalization acceptable to the interrogatee.
The threat of death has often been found to be worse than
useless. It "has the highest position in law as a defense,
but in many interrogation situations it is a highly ineffective
threat. Many prisoners, in fact, have refused to yield in the
face of such threats who have subsequently been 'broken' by other
procedures." (3) The principal reason is that the ultimate
threat is likely to induce sheer hopelessness if the interrogatee
does not believe that it is a trick; he feels that he is as
likely to be condemned after compliance as before. The threat of
death is also ineffective when used against hard-headed types who
realize that silencing them forever would defeat the
interrogator's purpose. If the threat is recognized as a bluff,
it will not only fail but also pave the way to failure for later
coercive ruses used by the interrogator.
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G. Debility
No report of scientific investigation of the effect of
debility upon the interrogatee's powers of resistance has been
discovered. For centuries interrogators have employed various
methods of inducing physical weakness: prolonged constraint;
prolonged exertion; extremes of heat, cold, or moisture; and
deprivation or drastic reduction of food or sleep. Apparently the
assumption is that lowering the source's physiological resistance
will lower his psychological capacity for opposition. If this
notion were valid, however, it might reasonably be expected that
those subjects who are physically weakest at the beginning of an
interrogation would be the quickest to capitulate, a concept not
supported by experience. The available evidence suggests that
resistance is sapped principally by psychological rather than
physical pressures. The threat of debility - for example, a brief
deprivation of food - may induce much more anxiety than prolonged
hunger, which will result after a while in apathy and, perhaps,
eventual delusions or hallucinations. In brief, it appears
probable that the techniques of inducing debility become
counter-productive at an early stage. The discomfort, tension,
and restless search for an avenue of escape are followed by
withdrawal symptoms, a turning away from external stimuli, and a
sluggish unresponsiveness.
Another objection to the deliberate inducing of debility is
that prolonged exertion, loss of sleep, etc., themselves become
patterns to which the subject adjusts through apathy. The
interrogator should use his power over the resistant subject's
physical environment to disrupt patterns of response, not to
create them. Meals and sleep granted irregularly, in more than
abundance or less than adequacy, the shifts occuring on no
discernible time pattern, will normally disorient an interrogatee
and sap his will to resist more effectively than a sustained
deprivation leading to debility.
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H. Pain
Everyone is aware that people react very differently to pain.
The reason, apparently, is not a physical difference in the
intensity of the sensation itself. Lawrence E. Hinkle observes,
"The sensation of pain seems to be roughly equal in all men,
that is to say, all people have approximately the same threshold
at which they begin to feel pain, and when carefully graded
stimuli are applied to them, their estimates of severity are
approximately the same.... Yet... when men are very highly
motivated... they have been known to carry out rather complex
tasks while enduring the most intense pain." He also states,
"In general, it appears that whatever may be the role of the
constitutional endowment in determining the reaction to pain, it
is a much less important determinant than is the attitude of the
man who experiences the pain." (7)
The wide range of individual reactions to pain may be
partially explicable in terms of early conditioning. The person
whose first encounters with pain were frightening and intense may
be more violently affected by its later infliction than one whose
original experiences were mild. Or the reverse may be true, and
the man whose childhood familiarized him with pain may dread it
less, and react less, than one whose distress is heightened by
fear of the unknown. The individual remains the determinant.
It has been plausibly suggested that, whereas pain inflicted
on a person from outside himself may actually focus or intensify
his will to resist, his resistance is likelier to be sapped by
pain which he seems to inflict upon himself. "In the simple
torture situation the contest is one between the individual and
his tormentor (.... and he can frequently endure). When the
individual is told to stand at attention for long periods, an
intervening factor is introduced. The immediate source of pain is
not the interrogator but the victim himself. The motivational
strength of the individual is likely to exhaust itself in this
internal encounter.... As long as the subject remains standing,
he is attributing to his captor the power to do something worse
to him, but there is actually no showdown of the ability of the
interrogator to do so." (4)
Interrogatees who are withholding but who feel qualms of guilt
and a secret desire to yield are likely to become intractable if
made to endure pain. The reason is that they can then interpret
the pain as punishment and hence as expiation. There are also
persons who enjoy pain and its anticipation and who will keep
back information that they might otherwise divulge if they are
given reason to expect that withholding will result in the
punishment that they want. Persons of considerable moral or
intellectual stature often find in pain inflicted by others a
confirmation of the belief that they are in the hands of
inferiors, and their resolve not to submit is strengthened.
Intense pain is quite likely to produce false confessions,
concocted as a means of escaping from distress. A time-consuming
delay results, while investigation is conducted and the
admissions are proven untrue. During this respite the
interrogatee can pull himself together. He may even use the time
to think up new, more complex "admissions" that take
still longer to disprove. KUBARK is especially vulnerable to such
tactics because the interrogation is conducted for the sake of
information and not for police purposes.
If an interrogatee is caused to suffer pain rather late in the
interrogation process and after other tactics have failed, he is
almost certain to conclude that the interrogator is becoming
desperate. He may then decide that if he can just hold out
against this final assault, he will win the struggle and his
freedom. And he is likely to be right. Interrogatees who have
withstood pain are more difficult to handle by other methods. The
effect has been not to repress the subject but to restore his
confidence and maturity.
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I. Heightened Suggestibility and Hypnosis
In recent years a number of hypotheses about hypnosis have
been advanced by psychologists and others in the guise of proven
principles. Among these are the flat assertions that a person
connot be hypnotized against his will; that while hypnotized he
cannot be induced to divulge information that he wants urgently
to conceal; and that he will not undertake, in trance or through
post-hypnotic suggestion, actions to which he would normally have
serious moral or ethical objections. If these and related
contentions were proven valid, hypnosis would have scant value
for the interrogator.
But despite the fact that hypnosis has been an object of
scientific inquiry for a very long time, none of these theories
has yet been tested adequately. Each of them is in conflict with
some observations of fact. In any event, an interrogation
handbook cannot and need not include a lengthy discussion of
hypnosis. The case officer or interrogator needs to know enough
about the subject to understand the circumstances under which
hypnosis can be a useful tool, so that he can request expert
assistance appropriately.
Operational personnel, including interrogators, who chance to
have some lay experience or skill in hypnotism should not
themselves use hypnotic techniques for interrogation or other
operational purposes. There are two reasons for this position.
The first is that hypnotism used as an operational tool by a
practitioner who is not a psychologist, psychiatrist, or M.D. can
produce irreversible psychological damage. The lay practitioner
does not know enough to use the technique safely. The second
reason is that an unsuccessful attempt to hypnotize a subject for
purposes of interrogation, or a successful attempt not adequately
covered by post-hypnotic amnesia or other protection, can easily
lead to lurid and embarrassing publicity or legal charges.
Hypnosis is frequently called a state of heightened
suggestibility, but the phrase is a description rather than a
definition. Merton M. Gill and Margaret Brenman state, "The
psychoanalytic theory of hypnosis clearly implies, where it does
not explicitly state, that hypnosis is a form of
regression." And they add, "...induction [of hypnosis]
is the process of bringing about a regression, while the hypnotic
state is the established regression." (13) It is suggested
that the interrogator will find this definition the most useful.
The problem of overcoming the resistance of an uncooperative
interrogatee is essentially a problem of inducing regression to a
level at which the resistance can no longer be sustained.
Hypnosis is one way of regressing people.
Martin T. Orne has written at some length about hypnosis and
interrogation. Almost all of his conclusions are tentatively
negative. Concerning the role played by the will or attitude of
the interrogates, Orne says, "Although the crucial
experiment has not yet been done, there is little or no evidence
to indicate that trance can be induced against a person's
wishes." He adds, "...the actual occurrence of the
trance state is related to the wish of the subject to enter
hypnosis." And he also observes, "...whether a subject
will or will not enter trance depends upon his relationship with
the hyponotist rather than upon the technical procedure of trance
induction." These views are probably representative of those
of many psychologists, but they are not definitive. As Orne
himself later points out, the interrogatee "... could be
given a hypnotic drug with appropriate verbal suggestions to talk
about a given topic. Eventually enough of the drug would be given
to cause a short period of unconsciousness. When the subject
wakes, the interrogator could then read from his 'notes' of the
hypnotic interview the information presumably told him."
(Orne had previously pointed out that this technique requires
that the interrogator possess significant information about the
subject without the subject's knowledge.) "It can readily be
seen how this... maneuver... would facilitate the elicitation of
information in subsequent interviews." (7) Techniques of
inducing trance in resistant subjects through preliminary
administration of so-called silent drugs (drugs which the subject
does not know he has taken) or through other non-routine methods
of induction are still under investigation. Until more facts are
known, the question of whether a resister can be hypnotized
involuntarily must go unanswered.
Orne also holds that even if a resister can be hypnotized, his
resistance does not cease. He postulates "... that only in
rare interrogation subjects would a sufficiently deep trance be
obtainable to even attempt to induce the subject to discuss
material which he is unwilling to discuss in the waking state.
The kind of information which can be obtained in these rare
instances is still an unanswered question." He adds that it
is doubtful that a subject in trance could be made to reveal
information which he wished to safeguard. But here too Orne seems
somewhat too cautious or pessimistic. Once an interrogatee is in
a hypnotic trance, his understanding of reality becomes subject
to manipulation. For example, a KUBARK interrogator could tell a
suspect double agent in trance that the KGB is conducting the
questioning, and thus invert the whole frame of reference. In
other words, Orne is probably right in holding that most
recalcitrant subjects will continue effective resistance as long
as the frame of reference is undisturbed. But once the subject is
tricked into believing that he is talking to friend rather than
foe, or that divulging the truth is the best way to serve his own
purposes, his resistance will be replaced by cooperation. The
value of hypnotic trance is not that it permits the interrogator
to impose his will but rather that it can be used to convince the
interrogatee that there is no valid reason not to be forthcoming.
A third objection raised by Orne and others is that material
elicited during trance is not reliable. Orne says, "... it
has been shown that the accuracy of such information... would not
be guaranteed since subjects in hypnosis are fully capable of
lying." Again, the observation is correct; no known
manipulative method guarantees veracity. But if hypnosis is
employed not as an immediate instrument for digging out the truth
but rather as a way of making the subject want to align himself
with his interrogators, the objection evaporates.
Hypnosis offers one advantage not inherent in other
interrogation techniques or aids: the post-hypnotic suggestion.
Under favorable circumstances it should be possible to administer
a silent drug to a resistant source, persuade him as the drug
takes effect that he is slipping into a hypnotic trance, place
him under actual hypnosis as consciousness is returning, shift
his frame of reference so that his reasons for resistance become
reasons for cooperating, interrogate him, and conclude the
session by implanting the suggestion that when he emerges from
trance he will not remember anything about what has happened.
This sketchy outline of possible uses of hypnosis in the
interrogation of resistant sources has no higher goal than to
remind operational personnel that the technique may provide the
answer to a problem not otherwise soluble. To repeat: hypnosis is
distinctly not a do-it-yourself project. Therefore the
interrogator, base, or center that is considering its use must
anticipate the timing sufficiently not only to secure the
obligatory headquarters permission but also to allow for an
expert's travel time and briefing.
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J. Narcosis
Just as the threat of pain may more effectively induce
compliance than its infliction, so an interrogatee's mistaken
belief that he has been drugged may make him a more useful
interrogation subject than he would be under narcosis. Louis A.
Gottschalk cites a group of studies as indicating "that 30
to 50 per cent of individuals are placebo reactors, that is,
respond with symptomatic relief to taking an inert
substance." (7) In the interrogation situation, moreover,
the effectiveness of a placebo may be enhanced because of its
ability to placate the conscience. The subject's primary source
of resistance to confession or divulgence may be pride,
patriotism, personal loyalty to superiors, or fear of retribution
if he is returned to their hands. Under such circumstances his
natural desire to escape from stress by complying with the
interrogator's wishes may become decisive if he is provided an
acceptable rationalization for compliance. "I was
drugged" is one of the best excuses.
Drugs are no more the answer to the interrogator's prayer than
the polygraph, hypnosis, or other aids. Studies and reports
"dealing with the validity of material extracted from
reluctant informants... indicate that there is no drug which can
force every informant to report all the information he has. Not
only may the inveterate criminal psychopath lie under the
influence of drugs which have been tested, but the relatively
normal and well-adjusted individual may also successfully
disguise factual data." (3) Gottschalk reinforces the latter
observation in mentioning an experiment involving drugs which
indicated that "the more normal, well-integrated individuals
could lie better than the guilt-ridden, neurotic subjects."
(7)
Nevertheless, drugs can be effective in overcoming resistance
not dissolved by other techniques. As has already been noted, the
so-called silent drug (a pharmacologically potent substance given
to a person unaware of its administration) can make possible the
induction of hypnotic trance in a previously unwilling subject.
Gottschalk says, "The judicious choice of a drug with
minimal side effects, its matching to the subject's personality,
careful gauging of dosage, and a sense of timing... [make] silent
administration a hard-to-equal ally for the hypnotist intent on
producing self-fulfilling and inescapable suggestions... the drug
effects should prove... compelling to the subject since the
perceived sensations originate entirely within himself." (7)
Particularly important is the reference to matching the drug
to the personality of the interrogatee. The effect of most drugs
depends more upon the personality of the subject than upon the
physical characteristics of the drugs themselves. If the approval
of Headquarters has been obtained and if a doctor is at hand for
administration, one of the most important of the interrogator's
functions is providing the doctor with a full and accurate
description of the psychological make-up of the interrogatee, to
facilitate the best possible choice of a drug.
Persons burdened with feelings of shame or guilt are likely to
unburden themselves when drugged, especially if these feelings
have been reinforced by the interrogator. And like the placebo,
the drug provides an excellent rationalization of helplessness
for the interrogatee who wants to yield but has hitherto been
unable to violate his own values or loyalties.
Like other coercive media, drugs may affect the content of
what an interrogatee divulges. Gottschalk notes that certain
drugs "may give rise to psychotic manifestations such as
hallucinations, illusions, delusions, or disorientation", so
that "the verbal material obtained cannot always be
considered valid." (7) For this reason drugs (and the other
aids discussed in this section) should not be used persistently
to facilitate the interrogative debriefing that follows
capitulation. Their function is to cause capitulation, to aid in
the shift from resistance to cooperation. Once this shift has
been accomplished, coercive techniques should be abandoned both
for moral reasons and because they are unnecessary and even
counter-productive.
This discussion does not include a list of drugs that have
been employed for interrogation purposes or a discussion of their
properties because these are medical considerations within the
province of a doctor rather than an interogator.
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K. The Detection of Malingering
The detection of malingering is obviously not an interrogation
technique, coercive or otherwise. But the history of
interrogation is studded with the stories of persons who have
attempted, often successfully, to evade the mounting pressures of
interrogation by feigning physical or mental illness. KUBARK
interrogators may encounter seemingly sick or irrational
interrogatees at times and places which make it difficult or
next-to-impossible to summon medical or other professional
assistance. Because a few tips may make it possible for the
interrogator to distinguish between the malingerer and the person
who is genuinely ill, and because both illness and malingering
are sometimes produced by coercive interrogation, a brief
discussion of the topic has been included here.
Most persons who feign a mental or physical illness do not
know enough about it to deceive the well-informed. Malcolm L.
Meltzer says, "The detection of malingering depends to a
great extent on the simulator's failure to understand adequately
the characteristics of the role he is feigning.... Often he
presents symptoms which are exceedingly rare, existing mainly in
the fancy of the layman. One such symptom is the delusion of
misidentification, characterized by the... belief that he is some
powerful or historic personage. This symptom is very unusual in
true psychosis, but is used by a number of simulators. In
schizophrenia, the onset tends to be gradual, delusions do not
spring up full-blown over night; in simulated disorders, the
onset is usually fast and delusions may be readily available. The
feigned psychosis often contains many contradictory and
inconsistent symptoms, rarely existing together. The malingerer
tends to go to extremes in his portrayal of his symptoms; he
exaggerates, overdramatizes, grimaces, shouts, is overly bizarre,
and calls attention to himself in other ways....
"Another characteristic of the malingerer is that he will
usually seek to evade or postpone examination. A study of the
behavior of lie-detector subjects, for example, showed that
persons later 'proven guilty' showed certain similarities of
behavior. The guilty persons were reluctant to take the test, and
they tried in various ways to postpone or delay it. They often
appeared highly anxious and sometimes took a hostile attitude
toward the test and the examiner. Evasive tactics sometimes
appeared, such as sighing, yawning, moving about, all of which
foil the examiner by obscuring the recording. Before the
examination, they felt it necessary to explain why their
responses might mislead the examiner into thinking they were
lying. Thus the procedure of subjecting a suspected malingerer to
a lie-detector test might evoke behavior which would reinforce
the suspicion of fraud." (7)
Meltzer also notes that malingerers who are not professional
psychologists can usually be exposed through Rorschach tests.
An important element in malingering is the frame of mind of
the examiner. A person pretending madness awakens in a
professional examiner not only suspicion but also a desire to
expose the fraud, whereas a well person who pretends to be
concealing mental illness and who permits only a minor symptom or
two to peep through is much likelier to create in the expert a
desire to expose the hidden sickness.
Meltzer observes that simulated mutism and amnesia can usually
be distinguished from the true states by narcoanalysis. The
reason, however, is the reverse of the popular misconception.
Under the influence of appropriate drugs the malingerer will
persist in not speaking or in not remembering, whereas the
symptoms of the genuinely afflicted will temporarily disappear.
Another technique is to pretend to take the deception seriously,
express grave concern, and tell the "patient" that the
only remedy for his illness is a series of electric shock
treatments or a frontal lobotomy.
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L. Conclusion
A brief summary of the foregoing may help to pull the major
concepts of coercive interrogation together:
1. The principal coercive techniques are arrest, detention,
the deprivation of sensory stimuli, threats and fear, debility,
pain, heightened suggestibility and hypnosis, and drugs.
2. If a coercive technique is to be used, or if two or more
are to be employed jointly, they should be chosen for their
effect upon the individual and carefully selected to match his
personality.
3. The usual effect of coercion is regression. The
interrogatee's mature defenses crumbles as he becomes more
childlike. During the process of regression the subject may
experience feelings of guilt, and it is usually useful to
intensify these.
4. When regression has proceeded far enough so that the
subject's desire to yield begins to overbalance his resistance,
the interrogator should supply a face-saving rationalization.
Like the coercive technique, the rationalization must be
carefully chosen to fit the subject's personality.
5. The pressures of duress should be slackened or lifted after
compliance has been obtained, so that the interrogatee's
voluntary cooperation will not be impeded.
No mention has been made of what is frequently the last step
in an interrogation conducted by a Communist service: the
attempted conversion. In the Western view the goal of the
questioning is information; once a sufficient degree of
cooperation has been obtained to permit the interrogator access
to the information he seeks, he is not ordinarily concerned with
the attitudes of the source. Under some circumstances, however,
this pragmatic indifference can be short-sighted. If the
interrogatee remains semi-hostile or remorseful after a
successful interrogation has ended, less time may be required to
complete his conversion (and conceivably to create an enduring
asset) than might be needed to deal with his antagonism if he is
merely squeezed and forgotten.
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